Month: October 2017

Twenty-Seven Educational Experts from Across the Nation Share Best Practices for Using Technology in Classrooms

Bloomington, IN (November 1, 2017)—The NOW Classrooms series, published by Solution Tree, presents classroom-ready lessons that support the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) Standards for Students. Educators can use the lessons, which are grounded in the essential four C skills—communication, collaboration, critical thinking, and creativity—to connect technology to key learning outcomes and prepare learners to succeed in the 21st century.

“My books are written with the classroom teacher in mind and contain strategies that are practical and easy to implement in the classroom,” explained author Meg Ormiston. “The tech-rockstar teachers get everything quickly and are racing on to the next tip, app or tool. Most teachers need more time to practice as they familiarize themselves with various digital tools—I write for these teachers.”

The books are organized by grade bands of K–2, 3–5, 6–8 and 9–12. Each book’s chapters are divided into several sections containing three lessons each—one novice lesson, one operational lesson and one wow lesson (spelling out “NOW”)—that readers can choose from, based on their experience with the technology and their students’ needs. The series also includes a leader’s guide, which outlines a flexible framework for driving instructional innovation schoolwide or districtwide.

Carole Colburn, a technology teacher at Highlander Way Middle School in Michigan, praised NOW Classrooms, Grades 6–8, stating, “I love this book and how the authors organized it around the ISTE standards, including terrific lesson ideas that teachers can immediately implement in any middle school classroom. It is a great resource, and I highly recommend it for any middle school teacher who wants to create a classroom environment full of engaged, 21st-century thinkers and learners!”

Readers interested in getting technology updates from the authors can follow #NowClassrooms on Twitter or Facebook.

For nearly 20 years, Solution Tree (https://www.solutiontree.com) has worked to transform education worldwide, empowering educators to raise student achievement. With more than 30,000 educators attending professional learning events and more than 4,260 professional development days in schools each year, Solution Tree helps teachers and administrators confront essential challenges in schools. Solution Tree has a catalog of 515 titles, hundreds of videos and online courses and is the creator of Global PD, an online tool that facilitates the work of professional learning communities. Follow @SolutionTree on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Learn more about Solution Tree.

There are hundreds of websites that make QR codes. But how do you know which one to use? And which apps are the best for scanning? And what are QR codes used for in the classroom? You’ll learn how to do all this in the next few paragraphs.

To make a QR code, first you need to find a website. There are a lot of them out there. Some require you to sign in and others are just plain bad. The one I used is called QR Code Generator. (A lot of them are called QR Code Generator though, so you’ll scan a QR code to get the ULR.) First you chose what your QR code will open up when you scan it. You can choose from websites, locations, contacts and text though there are more to chose. Pick your designated material and type in what you want to. Once you do that, find the QR on the right side of the page. Underneath it you’ll find two options: embed and download. Press download. Then some options will pop up. You can change the border, background, and foreground. But if you want to download it, find the four options of downloading in the bottom right corner. You can use any of the options but I used PNG, or image. When you click it, the finished QR code will pop up on a new page. If you’re doing this on an iPad (like me) just press and hold until save image appears. Press that. Your QR will be in your photos. You’ve just successfully made a QR code!

To scan a QR code, you first need a scanning app. Scan is a suggested app. Aim your iPad at the QR code so the square on the screen surrounds the QR. When it successfully scans the code, what ever you just scanned will pop up. Go to the website, read the text, or watch the video.

QR codes are a fun way to convey information. Whether you want to send them a link without emailing it to all of them or you want to do a picture walk without everyone getting up. They’re also perfect in Breakout EDUs.

Educational leaders are often called upon to plan and facilitate professional development, team meetings, and other events that require engaging the audience in learning and/or collaborating. This provides a wonderful opportunity to show staff various methods of using technology, and place them in the position to feel the effects! Below are a few ways I have used technology:

This free online tool has a variety of applications! During instructional coaching meetings, each coach posts her celebrations to a Padlet. Team members read the celebrations and are invited to ask questions to learn more about the post. At the end of the year, we have a record of where we started, and where we ended up. At a recent meeting for new staff, a Padlet was set up for posting questions. Columns with headers included categories for questions, and participants added their “posts” below the corresponding header. During the meeting answers were added. This provides a place for new staff to refer back to as the information is needed.

Part of my role as an administrator calls for conducting informal observations. At the start of each school year, I create a new Google Doc to record informal observations and provide comment access to staff being evaluated. Sometimes the coaches I evaluate will send me video of their meetings with teachers and request feedback. I link their video to the Google Doc, adding feedback and items to consider. Then, we use the comments feature to communicate. This method provides a record for me and the staff being evaluated to refer back to, and a meaningful way to document growth throughout the year.

Earlier today I facilitated a middle school social studies department meeting where we needed to examine our grade level priority standards and how they vertically align. Accessing a Google Doc for each grade level and accessing another for the vertical 6-8 look allowed for quick and easy collaboration. Staff were able to refer to their grade level doc, edit the 6-8 doc, and include additional information that will inform our upcoming curriculum revision work.

This social media tool helps me to share information and celebrate what I want to see more of for students. I follow other educators and experts in the industry, re-tweeting their helpful ideas and sometimes tagging staff members I know would benefit or are interested. Often times during professional development I tweet out pictures of what participants are doing and learning. By following many of the educators I work with, I am able to see what students are doing and share it with others. It has also been a nice surprise to see how digital connections can morph into human ones- I have been in multiple settings, including a yoga class, where I have met new educators simply because we follow one another on Twitter!

Please share some of the ways you use technology with your staff in the comments below!

“That’s it! I’m done. No more Technology – I don’t get it, my students don’t get – I certainly can’t use it to teach.”

That was my 8am “Good Morning” from a talented teacher as I walked into the teacher lounge.

I am an Instructional Coach and my primary role is to work with my fellow teachers to support student learning and growth – many times utilizing “technology” as a tool to enhance the student experience. After all, we are a 1:1 district. Strategically, my goal is to coordinate efforts with teachers in our district with a focus on the development and implementation of instructional strategies in all content areas and to support effective planning, instruction, and assessment for learning.

I have been her coach for the last 5 years. When I heard this – I thought of so many different ways to respond:

“Oh, that stinks!”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

“Having a bad day?”

Instead, I looked at this teacher and said, “NO! You are not allowed to say that. You can go to a corner and scream into a pillow all you want, but you won’t quit!”

She looked at me and….laughed!

We all need to remember that there are going to be times we want to pull our hair out, say “the kids can’t do it”, and “I quit!” In these moments we need to remember we have a choice!

We have a choice to continue to learn or give up.

We have a choice to challenge ourselves to be better or take the easy way out and quit.

This teacher’s choice…She chose the opportunity to get better and continue to move forward!

We sat down later that week and talked about all the ways she can continue to use technology with her students to engage them in their learning. Ideas such as using “Explain Everything” to show what they are thinking in math or students creating books about the science unit they are studying using “Book Creator”.

Sometimes all we need is a good idea or direction on where to begin. No doubt, all of these changes in today’s education process can be overwhelming. I am here to tell you that is “OK!” You are not alone in your frustration, your fading confidence or your feelings that you will never “get it.”

Technology can be a powerful tool for communication and learning if used properly within the classroom. Recently a teacher told me, “If teachers aren’t using Seesaw, they are really missing out!” Whether is it Seesaw or another Learning Management System, the ability to share learning with families at home, peers and teachers, is a strategy worth trying.

In my new role as Reading Specialist, I am able to see many different ways in which teachers in a 1:1 iPad district use technology in a meaningful way.

One fun way to integrate reading, writing and art is through app smashing. In a first grade classroom that I was recently in, the teacher read Leaf Man by Lois Ehlert. The students then talked about verbs. The teacher wrote down the words that students brainstormed on the board. She then took the following picture and uploaded it to Seesaw explaining the lesson to parents at home:

After the brainstorming a lesson on verbs, the students were asked to take a leaf and create a picture of a “Leaf Man” and show him acting out one of the verbs of their choice. Students then wrote a sentence about their “Leaf Man” using the verb of their choice describing their picture.

Then came the fun part. App smashing! Combining two apps at once! The students opened up ChatterPix and and took a photo of their picture. They read their sentence as if they were the “Leaf Man” talking.